The shooting death of an unarmed black woman at the hands of police that divided that has divided the town of Lima, Ohio, for months has been resolved — legally speaking. An all-white jury found Officer Joseph Chavalia not guilty of misdemeanor charges of negligent homicide and negligent assault.
Chavalia killed Tarika Wilson and wounded her one-year-old son, who had to have one of his fingers amputated, during a January SWAT raid on her house, the purpose of which was to arrest her drug-dealing boyfriend. Wilson was killed when Chavalia fired three shots into a bedroom where she had gathered her six children when the raid began. Chavalia admits he didn't have a clear view into the bedroom and could not tell if anyone was armed.
Chavalia, an officer of 32-years, had testified that he thought his life was in danger when he fired the shots. He said he saw a shadow coming from behind a partially open bedroom door and heard gunshots that he thought were aimed at him. It turned out the gunfire he heard was coming from downstairs, where officers shot two charging pit bulls.
Local black leaders weren't happy that Chavalia was only charged with two misdemeanors to begin with, and they certainly aren't happy that he was acquitted. They say that Chavalia's acquittal shows that black lives are not valued in their community.
“I’m hurting deeply,” said a local pastor who has been trying to work with the town's police since the shooting. “The message I got out of all this is that it’s OK for police to go and kill in a drug raid."
Shooting is obviously something police should be prepared for during a drug raid, just as drug raids should be something that one might expect when one is knowingly living with a drug dealer. What one shouldn't expect is for police officers to shoot blindly into rooms in a house they know — based on a front yard littered with toys and other indicators — to be filled with children. What one shouldn't expect is for there to be so few consequences when police kill and and wound innocents. The pastor said that the message the verdict sent was that it's OK to go and kill during a drug raid. The message I get is that police and juries see collateral damage (when it involves an unarmed black woman with bad taste in men and her child) as a necessary evil in the "war on crime." Were this woman and her child white, would the verdict be the same? It's hard for me to imagine that it would.
[MSNBC]
Interim Editor
Cord Jefferson Editorial Director
David Hauslaib Publisher
Jossip Initiatives
All Hip Hop
The Assimilated Negro
The B Life
Black Agenda Report
Black Male Appreciation
Black Prof
Black Voices
Bossip
Cake & Ice Cream
Clips and Kisses
Clutch Magazine
Concrete Loop
Crunk & Disorderly
Essence
EUR Web
The Fashion Bomb
Giant
Greasy Guide
Hip Candy
HipHopDX
Hip & Pop
Juicy News
King
Miss Info
Mollygood
My Urban Report
Nah Right
Necole Bitchie
Nova Slim
Panache Report
Racialicious
The Rap Up
Rhymes With Snitch
Sandra Rose
Shake Your Beauty
Straight Outta NYC
SOHH
TMZ
Vibe
Wendy Williams
XXL
Young, Black, Fabulous
From NYTimes.com:
"Black people in Lima, from the poorest citizens to religious and business leaders, complain that rogue police officers regularly stop them without cause, point guns in their faces, curse them and physically abuse them. They say the shooting of Ms. Wilson is only the latest example of a long-running pattern of a few white police officers treating African-Americans as people to be feared."
When is any politician ever going to address our racism problem? We need to reform our justice system and implement some kind of affirmative action/minority quota in the police force to reduce racism. Blatant structural racism like this is not acceptable for 21st century America.
quotas in institutions like the police wouldnt work. we need to change the attitudes of this country and we can only do that once we all truly learn that all people are indeed of value.
reform needs to be top down and bottom up, holistic and specific. reform needs to occur at both a federal level, state level and local level. by denouncing these acts, we bring them to national attention so that this case isnt forgotten about.
what happened in Ohio is atrocious and disgusting! that same case in Atlanta or Houston would have come to a different decision.
What do you do when the gang wears blue?
Let's shoot down these dumb white pigs.
SHIT LIKE THAT FUCKIN PISSES ME OFF SO MUCH!!!!!!
At this point I'm surprised that an uprising hasn't happened…. I know of Sharpton's 'days of disruption' with commuters and such in NYC in response to Sean Bell but I'm talking about on a national level. Jena 6, Bell, Wilson are only a few on the laundry list of blatant horrible acts fueled by race….. I'd be slightly afraid and by all means 'by the book' is best but I can't help but wonder what happened to the 'By Any Means' mentality? When will people have had enough?
Was the jury made up of the Klan?
I just don't understand how kiling an unarmed woman and shooting a baby can be found justifiable.
Chevalia got off way too easily for his actions and that's pitiful. My heart goes out to the young lady's family. But, hopefully, this will teach young women not to be with men who may put them and the lives of their children in danger.
Dude should've have gotten some kind of jail time for that.
on a side note though, what the hell was she thinkin' having her drug dealin boyfriend stay in the house with her SIX KIDS!!!! see, this is where we as black women mess up. you start messin with that kinda dude, and its almost like your asking to get involved in his mess.
i would NEVER be involved with no dude like that if i had kids, letting alone have him living with me and my kids!
The problem is that we keep seeing and responding to these incidents as individual cases rather deal with the systemic causes. We are just chasing ambulances, when we should be seeking Federal oversight of police.
Ah. Copying the NYPD way of doing things.
Josh some blk cops dislike blk people too.
@ nicole and lizzie: you should never, ever blame the victim. what happened is entirely the fault of the cops, and has nothing to do with any decision she made. cops shoot black folks all the time regardless of any phony drug war pretext. i bet the same logic of 'well she shouldnt have been dating a drug dealer' was also used by the jury when they ruled the officers not guilty. plus things just arent that simple, dealing is not most people's first choice if they have a better option, and when you have to support 6 kids you gonna do what you gotta do.
@FRI
I agree with you. The victims are not at fault, the stupid ass cops that aren't trained to do their job properly or cut corners are at fault. And how do you know she knew the boyfriend was a drug dealer? Hell, why should we even believe they had probable cause to believe the b/f was a drug dealer. Its sickening how easily he got off for hurting a child. If the kid had been white, I'm sure as hell there would have been an uproar. And why is this the first time I'm hearing about it. Ridiculous how media prioritizes issues. How is Britney's Spears 100th time in rehab more important than a child getting maimed by the police, the people who are suppose to be protecting him? Sometimes this world is revolting.
Oh, and why did the NYTimes.com use the word "complain" to describe the communities outcry for justice and explanation. How easily one word can spin a story against the victims.
@Daria "Ah. Copying the NYPD way of doing things."
and the NOPD
He should have been suspended without pay at least, jesus. Those poor children.
But SIX children by the age of 26, without the means to support them herself? What the hell was she thinking?! Nobody deserves what happened to her and her children, but that level of irresponsibility never ends well.